Asogli Queenmothers honour midwives

Queenmothers of Asogli State on Tuesday honoured nine midwives of the Ho Municipal Hospital for their efforts at reducing maternal mortality.

The Municipal Hospital recorded zero maternal death from June 2013 to June this year, down from 14 deaths in 2012, and three deaths in the first half of 2013.

Ghana has been working at achieving Millennium Development Goal Five, which seeks to reduce maternal mortality ratio by three quarters by 2015.

The Queenmothers, at a maiden award ceremony also honoured Dr Lawrence Kumi, Medical Superintendent of the Hospital and Dr Tamara Alvarez Ramirez from Cuba, for “good leadership and dedicated services to the Hospital”.

Mama Attrato II, Queenmother of Ho-Dome, initiator of the award, described the feat of the hospital within a year as a great achievement, worthy of celebration.

She said the Queenmothers had planned a demonstration two years ago to protest against the rate at which pregnant women were losing their lives at the facility, and therefore, commended the midwives for turning the situation around.

Mama Atrato said the award ceremony would be extended to other health facilities.

Dr Joseph Nuertey, Volta Regional Director of Health Services, commended workers of the Hospital for changing the image of the facility and also asked them to sustain the effort to keep maternal deaths low.

He noted that skilled delivery had started going up from 45.6 per cent in 2013 to 47.9 per cent at half year, with stillbirths decreasing from 1.9 per cent to 1.8 per cent.

Dr Nuertey said neonatal deaths had also decreased from five per 1000 to 3.1 per 1000.

He recommended the award scheme to other traditional areas to help reduce maternal mortality.